News August 23, 2022: Pilloxa, Worldfavor, Billo, Turbotic, Bärta, Candela, Northe, Meds and more

Here is today's curation of news from Sweden's startup and tech sector, exclusively for subscribers of Swedish Tech News.

Mergers & acquisitions

• Pilloxa (Stockholm, technology platform for better compliance that pharmaceutical companies use to design digital patient support) is being acquired by Stockholm-based company iZafe Group, provider of a robotized solution for safe medicine distribution in municipal professional home care, for around SEK30M (€2.8M, $2.8M) in newly issued iZafe shares (English). Pilloxa was founded in 2015 and has raised around SEK35M to date (including Vinnova support), from Bonnier Ventures and various angel investors.

Funding news

• Worldfavor (Stockholm, B2B digital sustainability platform): €10.2M ($10.1M) in a Series A funding round led by SEB Private Equity, with existing investors Brightly Ventures and Spintop Ventures also participating (English).
• Billo (Stockholm, digital mailbox service): SEK58M (€5.5M, $5.4M) from the company's co-founder & CEO Johan Eklöf and other undisclosed investors, at a valuation of around SEK225M. Breakit attempted to get Eklöf to talk a bit about the funding round and the 5-year old startup, but was politely brushed off (Swedish, machine translation).
• Turbotic (Stockholm, provider of enterprise AI and automation acceleration): SEK30M (€2.8M, $2.8M) from existing investor Öresund and undisclosed angel investors, for the continued US expansion (Swedish / DI Digital paywall).
• Bärta (Karlshamn, producer of vegan and organic foods): SEK14M (€1.3M, $1.3M) via equity crowdfunding from around 650 investors at Pepins. Now the company plans to prepare for a public listing (Swedish, machine translation).

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News from Swedish startups, the tech sector and VCs

• EV maker Polestar is teaming up with Stockholm-based Candela in the first ever battery deal between an electric car company and an electric boat maker. Polestar’s powerplants will find their way into two models of Candela’s flying electric boats (English).
• Northe, Stockholm-based EV charging platform for EV owners and companies, is launching its app in 14 additional European countries (Swedish, machine translation).
• Meds, Stockholm-based online pharmacy, intends to do a direct listing at the Nasdaq First North Growth Market. First trading day is expected to be September 1 (Swedish, machine translation).

Other interesting things from the startup/VC world & beyond

• YouTube appears to be rolling out a podcasting platform in the US (English).

Other interesting things related to Sweden

• Apple has finally sold the property on Kungsträdgården on which it wanted to build central Stockholm's first Apple Store – a plan which eventually was abandoned following resistance from the city's government. The price was not disclosed. The buyer is the real estate investor Jakob Johansson (Swedish / DI paywall).
• 6400 additional truck drivers will be needed in Sweden over the course of the next 12 months (Swedish, machine translation).

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That's it for today.